The Wall Street Journal, in the 2/3-2/4/24 weekend edition, printed an Op-Ed by Steven Stalinsky, the Executive Director of MEMRI (Middle East Media Research Institute). MEMRI has a good track record of accurately reporting news out of the Arab/Muslim press - not just the comments made for Western publications. The Op-Ed, "Welcome to Dearborn, America's Jihad Capital," got a lot of pushback from the Arab-Muslim community in Dearborn and Michigan, and from Democrats.
Here are a few highlights from the article. "Almost immediately after October 7, and long before Israel began its ground offensive in Gaza, people were celebrating the horrific events of that day in pro-Hamas rallies and marches throughout Dearborn."
Here's more: "...thousands march in support of Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran. Protesters, many with kaffiyehs covering their faces, shout 'intifada, intifada' (and) 'From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,' and 'America is a terrorist state.' Local imams give fiery antisemitic sermons."
And Stalinsky quotes someone he describes as "the most influential English-speaking jihadi sheikh," as having posted on Twitter after the atrocities of October 7: "The hearts haven't been overjoyed like this in so long."
Is our government aware of the radical, terrorist supporting nature of Dearborn? Stalinsky: "A 2001 Michigan State Police assessment submitted to the Justice Department after 9/11 called Dearborn 'a major financial support center' and a 'recruiting area and potential support base' for international terror groups, including possible sleeper cells."
Stalinsky, along with Yigal Carmon, the two co-founders of MEMRI, were interviewed by the WSJ, and that interview was published in the 1/13-1/14/24 weekend edition. Stalinsky said: "There is an element of trying to intimidate the Jewish community, going to kosher restaurants, community centers, Hanukkah celebrations, harassing Jewish students."
And this very important point was made (in case anyone hasn't noticed it from even a cursory watching or reading of the news: "Efforts to disrupt Thanksgiving and Christmas celebrations, and to block roads, bridges and tunnels, also suggest a new willingness to push around the American majority."
The Mayor of Dearborn, Abdullah Hammoud, called the Op-Ed "inflammatory," and asserted that it "led to an alarming increase in bigoted and Islamophobic rhetoric online targeting the city." CAIR (the Council on American Islamic Relations) called the article "inflammatory anti-Muslim commentary." Which is ironic, given that MEMRI caught Nihad Awad, CAIR's Executive Director, celebrating the October 7 attack by Hamas as an act of "self-defense," and Gazan liberation.
In a front page article of the 2/15/24 New York Times, Salma Hamamy is described a s "one of the most prominent faces of the pro-Palestinian movement on campus" at the University of Michigan. She leads anti-Israel rallies with chants such as this: "One, two, three, four, open up the prison doors! Five, six, seven, eight, Israel is a terrorist state."
After all the underground tunnels and other infrastructure built by Hamas, it is just extraordinary that anyone can claim that Gaza is an open-air prison controlled by Israel. Hundreds of miles of tunnels built with sophisticated material certainly suggests that Israel has little or no control over what gets into Gaza. Also ironic is the fact that the murder of men, women and children, and the rape and mutilation of women's bodies, is apparently not considered "terrorism" by Ms. Hamamy.
The Democratic Majority whip in the Michigan State Senate, said this of the Op-Ed: "Michigan is a diverse, beautiful place where hate, bigotry, racism and demonization have no place." To which I would add - unless it's directed at Jews.
